Online review sites are becoming increasingly popular, but how important are they to small businesses?  Are they forums that you should be paying attention to, or just hoping that by offering the best possible customer service experience, the positive reviews will come in time?

Yelp recently announced some statistics related to a reader survey, and some of the numbers were interesting, including how often and how many reviews people typically look at before making a decision.  There are currently over 7 million reviews on Yelp alone, one of a number of online review sites that people can use to say whatever they want about an experience with any business.  Most of the reviews are for local businesses, with searches conducted inside one’s own neighborhood.  So on a targeted level, Yelp makes sense for people looking to get word of mouth information about what’s around them.

Lisa Barone recently wrote a piece about getting the most out of Yelp for your small business on Small Business Trends, including interesting tips and tricks like unlocking your business listing.  There is also a section on how best to respond to reviews and engage.

But the bigger question is, is this something that you should be paying attention to, or do these review sites not provide value?  How much weight do they carry?  Have you personally seen results from Yelp that lead you to believe you should invest time in learning more about it.

*Image courtesy of Yelp.com